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Hugh Canning reviews the classical music year

Simon Rattle had an instant impact at the LSO and the CBSO’s new music director, Mirga Grazinyte-Tyla, set the bar high

Hugh Canning

Things are looking up: Rattle leads his first LSO concert, at the Barbican in September. Uncertainty still surrounds the orchestra’s new homeDOUG PETERS/PA WIRE

The Sunday Times, December 31 2017, 12:01am

In case anyone hadn’t noticed, Simon Rattle, newly ensconced as the London Symphony Orchestra’s first music director (his predecessors have all been principal conductors), dominated the musical horizon in 2017 — as he clearly will for years to come, if plans to build him a new concert hall in the capital make any headway during the next decade.

His inaugural LSO festival, This Is Rattle, proved a typically all-embracing celebration of what a modern orchestra might achieve in a state-of-the-art new venue. At the time of writing, it’s still a roundabout occupied by the Museum of London, although that could change, depending on how much money is privately raised for the project. (The government has already decreed that it won’t pay.)

Rattle’s opening programmes were…

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